Coma encephalitis epidemic - the most mysterious disease in the history of world medicine

Coma encephalitis or Economo disease (also known as sleeping sickness - people with this disease want to sleep all the time, and often do not wake up, or are disabled), recorded since the 17th century, is one of the strange disease and is an unsolved mystery.

Appearance

Somnolence was first observed in the 17th century, when some people in London (England) suddenly fell into a prolonged state of sleep with symptoms similar to encephalitis, not waking up. after a few weeks, without drinking, without eating… People tried to wake them up with noise, light and other ways, but to no avail. The disease was first described in 1917 by the Austrian psychiatrist and neurologist Konstantin von Economo, who called it 'coma encephalitis' (hence what it is sometimes called Economo's disease). .

The first symptoms often appear quite suddenly, starting with headache and feeling tired, then appear a state of lethargy, sometimes accompanied by delirium, but the patient wakes easily. The disease can lead to premature death or after several weeks; but it can last for weeks or even months. The scary thing is that the disease does not have uniform symptoms - it is like a multi-headed chickenpox, which manifests itself in different ways.

Over hundreds of years and until now, the origin and treatment of comatose encephalitis remains a great challenge for scientists.

One-third of sleep patients die in the acute phase, in a coma that cannot be awakened or fall into a state of insomnia so severe that they cannot be brought to sleep in any way, often ending in death within minutes. 10 to 14 days. Due to the difficulty of breathing, the patient often performs strange positions while sleeping. Sometimes insomnia is accompanied by constant high excitement, driving the patient into a frenzy, both physically and mentally.

These patients remained in a state of euphoria and incessant movement until death, due to complete exhaustion for 1 week or 10 days. The total number of deaths is estimated at 1.6 million (documented 5 million, epidemic lasting 10 years), about 20% of patients who survive need professional care for the rest of their lives. ; Less than one third of patients recover completely.

Coma encephalitis did not recur for more than two centuries - until the winter of 1916-1917, when people in Vienna (Austria) and other European cities suddenly began to fall asleep. One of the first cases was recorded near Verdun in France, where the disease struck and claimed the lives of several Atlanta soldiers. During the pandemic, everyone was diagnosed with sleeping sickness, because too much sleep leading to death was the only sign of the disease.

However, at the time, everything was attributed to the soldier's chronic overload and fatigue. Doctors also at times attributed their unusual symptoms to mustard gas, which was widely used during the war. But then the commoners also began to get sick, so the doctors had to admit it wasn't the poison gas. The disease was spreading rapidly across the planet at the same time as the Spanish flu, which killed 50 million people, causing less concern.

Sleeping sickness in the Soviet Union

From Europe, coma encephalitis reached Ukraine and Russia of the Soviet Union. In Nizhny Novgorod, the first case of the disease was recorded in March 1921, and within three years, in this territory, 18 men and 13 women were infected. In Moscow, the first carriers of the disease appeared in September 1922, 2 months later there was a sudden spike in the number of patients with strange symptoms - lethargy, difficulty breathing, paralyzed eyes, and fever. , is difficult to wake up, they fall asleep even while eating.

The doctors noted that, in patients with widespread paralysis of the eye muscles, eyelids drooped, some cases even developed into strabismus; It is not possible to determine which classes of the population are at risk and the prevalence of the disease - everyone, regardless of age, sex and social background, gets sick. Since sleeping sickness is transmitted by airborne droplets, it is believed that the causative agent is an unidentified virus. There is speculation that the outbreak is related to the aftermath of the Spanish flu that raged in 1918-1919.

Either the Europeans were weakened by the flu, becoming 'easy prey' for the new virus, or encephalitis became a late complication of the Spanish flu. According to Professor of Neurological Diseases at Moscow University Mikhail Margulis, in early 1923, the number of cases in the Soviet capital was about 100, with the highest incidence in January. He describes the symptoms of sleeping sickness: the patients fall into a long, long sleep, but they remain partially awake.

Sleep can last from a week to a month, depending on the complexity of the disease form and the characteristics of the human immune system. Among the patients of Старо-Екатерининская Hospital diagnosed with this condition, one in four dies. People who recover who have tried to wake up can never return to their normal lives, they remain paralyzed or lose their minds; The most harmless complication after the disease is strabismus.

The sleeping epidemic in the USSR became a real emergency, a commission was created to study the Economo disease. The rich clinical observations became the basis for the monographs of N. Chetverikov, A. Grinshtein, as well as the published collective medical collections. These experts noted an increase in the prevalence of sleeping sickness in the Jewish population, as well as the correlation of the disease with trauma and other illnesses.

However, Soviet medicine was unable to outline an effective treatment, and the West was also mired in conjecture. Soviet doctors bet on strengthening immunity, improving overall diet, proper physical activity and free medical care, including annual physical examination. To protect yourself from infection, Margulis advises taking 'the same precautions as for other infectious diseases'.

The sleeping sickness spread across the globe until 1927.5 million people fell ill with a coma, but in all countries the epidemic disappeared as suddenly and as mysteriously as it had started. Today, Economo encephalitis is called a 'rare clinical disease', it has never returned to massive scale. The last major outbreak was recorded on the territory of the former Soviet Union - in 2014, 33 residents of the Akmola region of Kazakhstan were infected.

For hundreds of years, the most advanced laboratories and leading scientists have tried to explain coma encephalitis and develop a cure, but the 'drowsy virus' - the causative agent The plague of comatose encephalitis has yet to be isolated, the disease remains one of the greatest mysteries in history.